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About two-thirds of South India tuned into news from as early as 6.30 am on the election result day, leading to a nearly five-fold spike in news channel viewership in the region. People in the South spent twice the time spent by Hindi speaking States on watching news on May 23.
Out of 258.5 million TV-viewing individuals between the four States in the south, 65 per cent (167.3mn) watched some news channel on 23 May, an increase of 67 per cent compared with a regular day. The total news viewership during the day increased by 416 per cent to 721 million impressions, compared with the previous eight weeks, data from BARC showed.
While in the Hindi-speaking markets, the time spent on news was 1 hour, 22 mins and 36 seconds, in South, the average time spent on TV was as high as 2 hours, 5 minutes and 34 seconds.
Even though the counting started at 8.00 am, the news genre had started picking up from 6.30 am in the morning. All four markets saw the highest viewership for the day from 8.00 am to 12.00 pm, following which the viewership dropped across markets but continued throughout the day compared with the previous eight weeks’ average.
Youth leads the growth
Youth (15-21 years) led the growth in news viewership on the election day, having grown the most with 451 per cent increase compared with the previous eight weeks, recording 101 million impressions. The highest contributors to viewership were the age groups 41-50 and 31-40, with 125 million and 124 million impressions respectively. The highest polling percentage of 80 per cent was noted in Andhra Pradesh. Andhra Pradesh and Telangana saw the highest viewership across the southern States at 73 per cent. Viewership in Kerala stood at 68 per cent, in Karnataka at 67 per cent and in Tamil Nadu at 60 per cent.
Hindi news channels were viewed by 279 million people over the week, an increase of 30 per cent versus the previous four-week average.
English news channels were viewed by 14 million people over the week, an increase of 60 per cent versus the previous four-week average.
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